Death of Olivia

November 1962

November 1962

In November 1962, Olivia 'Twenty' Dahl, eldest daughter of Roald Dahl and Patricia Neal, died from measles encephalitis. She was seven years old and contracted the illness whilst at school.

Roald's elder sister Astri was also seven years old when she died in 1920, a sad coincidence Roald himself notes in Boy: Tales of Childhood.

Roald wrote movingly about the death of his daughter in a pamphlet he contributed to The Sandwell Health Authority in 1986, which urges parents to have their children vaccinated against measles. The text is reproduced below. In 2015, Roald Dahl's grandson Ned Donovan also wrote about his memories and the later response to the letter.

After her death, a portrait of Olivia was fixed to the wall of the Writing Hut where Roald Dahl wrote many of his famous stories, including the two he dedicated to her. James and the Giant Peach was published the year before Olivia's death in 1961. The BFG - a tale he first told to Olivia and her sister Tessa as a bedtime story - was published 21 years later, in 1982, and dedicated to her memory.